


Friendly Fire

by thelastjedi



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Christmas Fluff, F/M, this is super dumb
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-11
Updated: 2019-12-11
Packaged: 2021-02-25 20:56:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21761818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelastjedi/pseuds/thelastjedi
Summary: Bucky ropes you into helping him decorate for Christmas but you’re both as chaotic as each other.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader
Comments: 1
Kudos: 29





	Friendly Fire

“’Eh’ is not an acceptable answer,” Bucky said adamantly.

“Yes, it is!”

“Not when my question was _‘Is this going to explode?’”_

“Technicalities,” you shrugged from your crouched position on the floor and continued to make some tweaks here and there. 

Around a half hour ago, Bucky had knocked on your door on behalf of himself and his roommate Steve and asked you to help decorate their apartment for Christmas. Apparently during their own attempts last year, the boys had bickered back and forth about which decorations should be placed where and after an hour of arguing, had ended up with nothing but a mangled tree and a few measly pieces of tinsel. This year, before a word could even be said (and before Steve came home), Bucky had immediately came to your apartment across the hall to ask for your assistance.

And so, there you were; one amateur and one savant (if you did say so yourself) staring down at a pile of tangled wires and other miscellaneous trinkets that were already beginning to frustrate you to no end. You knew that the lights were most likely unsalvageable, but you didn’t want to give up right away. You’d be damned if you let them beat you.

“This damn thing,” you mumbled to herself as a bead of sweat made it’s way down your forehead.

“Listen, maybe we should leave those,” Bucky leaned over and put a hand on your arm. “I think they’re beyond saving.”

“What the hell happened to these things?” you asked with a huff.

“Uh,” Bucky scratched at the back of his neck nervously. “Our old lights got… misplaced last year so my mother gave me her spare ones. They’re probably years old by now.”

“Misplaced? How did they get _misplaced_?”

Bucky muttered something unintelligible under his breath.

“Huh?”

“ _I threw them out the window!_ ”

You blinked. “Are you kidding me?”

“Look, Steve is a real perfectionist and he was driving me nuts!” he claimed heatedly. “So yeah, _maybe_ I dangled them out the window and threatened him to calm down. _Maybe_ he refused to let up and I let them fall. Whatever. You have no proof.”

“You mean other than the fact that you just admitted it?” you paused your work for a moment to make your way to the aforementioned window and squinted into the distance. “Oh my god, are they _still in the tree_?”

There was a pause.

“I plead the fifth?” Bucky said weakly.

“Dork,” you stated, the beginnings of a smug smile beginning to show on your lips.

Your friend rolled his eyes playfully. “Yeah, so? I’ll get them later, I promise. Now get back to work, Mrs. Claus.”

You snorted in amusement. “What does that make you? Santa? Frosty the Snowman?”

“You’re hilarious,” replied Bucky, though his tone said otherwise.

“I’m the best,” you argued.

“You know what’s not the best?” Bucky asked with a raise of his brow. “ _That_.”

Following his pointed finger, you rolled your eyes and knelt back down to the mess. The wires to the fairy lights he had provided you with were fraying, some of the metal strands already exposed. 

“How do we know these things even work?” you questioned, successfully untangling a knot.

“Only one way to find out, I guess,” Bucky said as he stepped forward to put the plug into the socket.

“Wait, wait, Bucky don’t—”

You jumped back as a spark burst out of the hunk of junk you had been attempting (also known as ‘failing’) to fix and stumbled into Bucky’s legs. “Holy shit!”

Instantly, Bucky bent down to grab you by the upper arms and pull you into a standing position, away from the flames.

“It’s only a little bit on fire,” you said from your position behind Bucky who had an arm out in front of you to stop you from getting any closer to the sparks. “Maybe we could still use them?” One look from Bucky stopped you from continuing.

“Stay back,” he said and stripped off his jacket.

“What are you doing?” you asked as you watched him inch closer to the fire hazard.

Bucky lifted one shoulder in a shrugging motion. “Gotta stop this from escalating somehow.” 

Without another word, he quickly threw his jacket on top of the wires to smother the smoke and the two of you watched anxiously as the tiny flames that had begun to show slowly petered out.

You were safe.

For about 10 seconds.

“Bucky?” called a voice that pulled both yourself and Bucky away from the mess you had accidentally created. “What’s going on here?”

“Uh, everything is fine,” Bucky said quickly, stepping in front of the pile in a lame attempt to hide it from his friend. “Just a slight technical problem.”

“What kind of problem?”

“We may have almost set your home on fire?” you supplied with a slight wince. “I mean, we didn’t. _Totally_. I promise… But hypothetically, that’s a thing you should probably be aware of.”

A ghost of a smile showed on Bucky’s face.

“You call a fire a ‘slight problem’?” Steve asked.

Chuckling nervously, Bucky reached up to smooth his hair out of his face. “See, when you went out earlier, I figured I could get the place Christmas ready before you came back. You know, avoid the drama of last year? I asked her to help with everything and… Turns out our lights are kind of beyond repair.”

“I noticed,” Steve said with a nod towards the still smoking pile behind the man. He sighed in resignation before making his way to the wires. “You wanna take your jacket back?”

Nodding in realisation, Bucky grabbed his jacket from the wreckage. Surprisingly, it wasn’t _too_ badly damaged. It had a burn mark under one arm, a slight hole in a place or two (although they may have already been there) but overall, it could’ve been worse.

As Steve got to work on removing what used to be Bucky’s mother’s lights, he continued to speak. “Maybe you two should get out of here. Get some new lights?”

“Yep,” Bucky said, more than happy to leave, just as you mumbled a “Sorry, Steve.”

With a gesture of his hand, Bucky led the way as you both quickly made their exit.

Steve watched the pair leave with the ghost of a smile and a shake of his head.

“Idiots.”

* * *

Once you had passed the threshold of the apartment building into the cool air, you both began to laugh.

“Did that really just happen?” Bucky asked with a grin. “Did we really just cause a fire and then get away with it?”

“Steve is a very nice man,” you replied honestly. “I think we definitely owe him one now.”

“I’d say you owed me one, too.”

“What?” you asked with a small frown. “Why?”

“Look at my poor jacket!” Bucky held up his leather jacket for you to see. “What did it ever do to you?”

“I could get Wanda to fix that for you,” you offered. “Though it _was_ kind of yourown fault.”

Bucky smirked. “Would you rather I left you there to catch fire?”

“I’m not saying that it wasn’t heroic, Barnes,” you joked. “I’m just saying that you _willingly_ damaged that jacket.”

Bucky paused in thought before pulling the jacket back on anyway. “How about we go grab the old lights from up there? I’ll give you a boost.” Without waiting for an answer, Bucky continued walking towards the tree he’d just pointed at.

You continued to grin as you quickened your pace to catch up with him. “You’re just changing the subject because you know I’m right.”

He scoffed. “I am not.”

“Are too.”


End file.
